


rare as the glimmer of a comet in the sky (he feels like home)

by mysteriesofloves



Series: the moon’s never seen me before (i’m reflecting light) [2]
Category: Gossip Girl (TV 2007)
Genre: Established Relationship, F/M, a load of mindless fluff. and some light angst cause i’m me
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-15
Updated: 2020-12-15
Packaged: 2021-03-11 01:34:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,811
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28087032
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mysteriesofloves/pseuds/mysteriesofloves
Summary: It’s been years, since something like this. Truthfully, there has never been anything like this.
Relationships: Dan Humphrey/Blair Waldorf
Series: the moon’s never seen me before (i’m reflecting light) [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2058447
Comments: 14
Kudos: 85





	rare as the glimmer of a comet in the sky (he feels like home)

**Author's Note:**

> this sorta just fell out of me in one day. formatting is different than the first part because it’s just some vignettes! title from long story short by tswift you know the drill

**_winter._ **

When she wakes, it’s to the low hum of a snore against her shoulder. 

Blair is not a stranger to a non-empty bed. It’s been years, though, a decade she thinks, since Henry’s bony little body, like a baby bird, was nestled against her under the covers. She always let him in, even though they advised against it, in the books and on the afternoon talk shows. When he came in with those pretty porcelain cheeks (her claim to him, that and the curls) all red from crying, she let him in. When he wanted his mommy, she let him in, because that’s who she was.

It’s been years, though, since something like this. Truthfully, she thinks, there has never been anything like this.

The low hum of his snore against her shoulder, his arm heavy around her waist, the solid evidence of morning prodding the back of her thigh. She brushes herself back onto him, hoping the friction is enough to wake him up. It isn’t, of course, and so she twists in his grasp to scratch at his cheek. “Hi,” she says, when she feels his lashes flutter on her skin. She pops her hips back, moving past brush and straight to grind.

Seemingly, he takes a moment to assess his surroundings. Then, the hand at her waist creeps up to her chest, the way the slant of light creeps up the bed between the gap in the curtains.

He laughs warm and gruff into the side of her neck. “Morning,” he says. She melts.

  
  


*

_“Mom!_ There’s a man in the kitchen!”

She pads around the corner, bare feet pitter-pattering on the hardwood matching the rain on the windows, tapping Henry on the back of the head with her rolled up newspaper and a knowing little smirk. 

“Jokes stop being funny the more times you tell them,” she says, then turns to Dan, bopping his nose with the paper. “He gets that from you.”

Dan hired new openers to give him time to do this — _this_ being stand around in wrinkled pajamas and sex hair and make breakfast for her kid. _It’s no big deal,_ he’d said. But it felt like one, to her.

On the counter, a spread of waffles like some sugar-coated, carb-filled Last Supper. Her stomach rumbles at the sight, the smell. He’d worn her out last night, and last night again, and this morning, and this morning again. There’s very little to complain about in her life. It’s too bad.

“Now what’s all this?”

“Don’t worry,” Henry says, mouth full, cream and sugar on his nose, lips, chin. She smiles despite herself. “It’s back to oat bran and yogurt tomorrow.”

“He’s a young man,” Dan says, poised at the waffle maker, as if there isn’t enough. “He needs sustenance.”

“And what’s your excuse?”

He lowers to brush his lips over the shell of her ear. “I need sustenance to keep up with you.”

“Heard that,” Henry calls. “Have to go burst my eardrums now, thanks.”

One hand at his phone, scrolling, brows furrowed as his eyes flit across the screen. In the other, a waffle topped with cinnamon-sugar bananas and whipped cream.

“Cavemen, both of you.”

Henry ignores her. Dan presses a kiss to the side of her jaw.

She turns, propping her hip against the counter, watching Henry as he wipes the back of his hand across his mouth. He got an internship at the Metropolitan, and he’s all done up for it.

“Stop looking at me like that,” he mumbles, without looking up from his phone.

“You look so handsome, peanut.”

Henry shrugs, sucking his thumb in and out of his mouth with a _pop._ He hops off the breakfast stool, heading for the bathroom. 

“Strawberries in January,” Dan says, his voice low, picking one up and popping it in Blair’s mouth. She licks the syrup off his fingers slowly. “When they’re still a bit bitter, tangy, and you glaze them in sugar. That’s how you taste.”

She arches a brow, smiling. “He’s a poet.”

His hand threads through her hair, tugging her to him, and she sighs the moment their mouths meet. She thinks first of last night, standing at the edge of the bed, as he kissed up and down her neck, chastising him for encouraging Henry to apply to non-Ivy’s ( _“as backups”,_ as if a Waldorf boy would need a backup) and how he’d picked her up clean off the floor, tossing her gently on the covers so she bounced with laughter. _Come on,_ he’d whispered. _Be a little sweet on me, won’t you?_

She thinks second of how hungry she is.

His teeth tug at her bottom lip, opening her up for his tongue to slide along hers. She doesn’t think about anything then.

“If I come around and you guys are making out I might actually vomit my breakfast all over the counter.”

She drops her forehead to Dan’s chest with a light laugh, his hand coming up immediately to palm her hair. He says, “As long as you clean it up.”

“Bye, Mom.” Henry says, slinging his bag over his shoulder. “Bye, Dan.”

Blair knows, with his mouth still a little full, what it sounds like. When she looks back up at Dan, he’s blushing.

  
  


**_spring._ **

Dan scratches at his cheek. “You’re really going to regret making me shave for this.”

Henry snorts. Dan continues, “When it starts to grow back out, which by the way is _right now,_ you’re going to get friction burn on your –“

“Ah!” Henry calls, taking his hands off the elevator handle to cover his ears. “I’m still here.”

 _“Face,”_ Dan says pointedly. He swings the bag of hostess gifts in his hand back and forth. She insisted that one bottle of wine was enough, but he’s gotten into jam making. She loves, loves, loves him.

“You could just use this as an opportunity to adopt a regular shaving regiment,” Blair says, arms crossed, nails playing nervously at the crease of her elbow.

Dan tilts his head at her with big eyes, bottom lip jutting out. “But then how will I be recognized by fellow unwashed bohemian hipsters?”

“The haircut should do it,” Henry mumbles. 

Dan sticks his middle finger up. “I’ve already adopted something annoying that takes up a lot of my time.”

“Stop it, both of you. I need you two to be perfect gentlemen tonight.”

“I hope Dan screws up and Grandma unhinges her jaw and swallows him whole.”

Blair senses disaster the moment before it strikes, as Dan’s arm comes up to hook around Henry’s neck, tugging him forward, his knuckle running over all of Blair’s hard work.

When the elevator doors open, it’s to Blair prying her boys away from each other, wrestling like rowdy little kids, a mess of brown curls and red faces. Eleanor stands before them, startled, and Blair is nauseous but deliriously happy, enough so that she doesn’t really care what the verdict is.

And then, Dan stands up straight, dropping his hold on Henry and sticking a steady hand out. “Mrs. Rose,” he says, lifting the bag of blackberry jam and peach cobbler, and, yes, a bottle of wine. “It’s a pleasure to meet you.”

Perfect gentleman, just like that. Blair doesn’t know what forces of nature came together to create this man, but she hopes they’re lending a hand with her own.

  
  


**_summer._ **

They’ve been kissing so long her lips have gone numb, the rest of her prickling with anticipation, pins and needles full of want everywhere. Dan makes out like they’re teenagers, tracing circles over her waist like she’s a wind-up toy, kissing her hard and hungry until she’s so flushed with excitement she feels lightheaded. Their mouths moving in the blue-dark of the living room, like she’s in high school again, in a movie theatre kissing a boy like she’s trying to scarf him down. Not that that was something she ever did in high school.

She nips down his neck, his breath hitching like she has it caught between her teeth. Her hand roams over his abdomen, slipping under the thin material of his t-shirt and into the coarse hair above the waistband of his jeans, then flicking open the button and inching under the waistband of his jeans, then —

“Not yet, sweetheart,” he says, voice thick like honey she wants to fill her mouth with. “I wanna take my time with you.”

Heat ripples through her stomach, volcanic between her legs. She shifts to seat herself in his lap, buckling down in an effort to try and relieve some tension, admiring the mouth-shaped bruise at the base of his throat. She traces a perfectly manicured nail over the sensitive skin, just the right amount of bite, making him wince. Her fingers curl around his wrists, pinning them to his sides. He leans up to bite at her lower lip, as if just to be contrarian. “I’m not sweet,” she says.

“No, you’re not.” He says, serious and tender, the way he always gets when he’s this turned on. 

“I don’t think you can handle slow,” she says.

“You think I’m weak?”

“I think you’re –“

The door opens, the harsh clang of dropped keys on hardwood startling them both.

Blair adjusts the straps of her tank top, slipping out of Dan’s lap and back onto the couch. Dan shifts to flick on the lamp, the dark room expanding with low warm-golden light, like a sunset in reverse, lighting up over Henry’s face; his eyes puffy, cheeks so red she can almost feel the stinging heat of them from where she sits. He stumbles forward, Dan standing abruptly to catch his shoulder.

“Oh, Hen.” Dan says, his hand running over Henry’s disheveled curls. “I think you need some coffee, kid.”

Henry stumbles again, his foot catching his ankle, and tumbles over onto the couch next to her. She’s struck still when the stench of his breath hits her, the perfume of her old friends.

Blair is nauseous with nostalgia, frozen solid with the kind of sternness she only lapses into out of panic, so caught up in her anger that it startles her to hear his small choked sob, his head moving into her lap, his wet cheeks smearing hot streaks on the tops of her thighs. 

“Why won’t he call me?” Henry says, each word hoarse and strangled, bringing forth another bout of sour breath. “What did I do?” 

“Oh, baby.” Her hand smooths over his hair, wiping futilely at his cheeks. Dan grimaces, bending to get his shoes off him.

“Why doesn’t he like me?”

Each sob that shakes him is like a flicker on a film reel, replaying her own lowest moments but passing on the pain. She hugs him closer, like if she squeezes hard enough she can collect it up and give it back to herself, so he doesn’t have to feel it.

 _“Mom,”_ he chokes out, her little sparrow, in all his fragility he tries so hard to hide. “One minute he’s here and I think he likes me and then he’s gone and I –“

“I know, baby. You’ll be okay.”

When she wakes, it’s to early dawn creeping in under the curtains, spreading across the floor like a flood of light. Her neck cracks with each move, her spine stiff and her legs asleep, her little boy still cuddled up against her. She blinks the room into focus, Dan asleep in the armchair next to them. She shifts away slowly, moving to settle into Dan’s lap, his arms curling around her before he’s even fully awake.

“Hey,” he says, pressing a kiss to her shoulder as he looks over it. “Wanna fill me in on what that was about?”

“Later,” Blair mumbles. “Let’s go to bed.”

“Hey, jellybean.” She says, brushing his hair from his eyes. His forehead is hot to the touch, cheeks puffy and red like when he was five and had a fever of 104 and he wouldn’t stop crying, and she took him to the ER and sobbed into her hands. He relaxes visibly at the pet name, the gentle touch. “Hungover, huh?”

“Sorry,” he mumbles. 

“It’s okay,” she says. “Didn’t mommy teach you to drink lots of water and take an aspirin?”

Henry coughs, but it sounds light enough to be a laugh. “I think daddy did that.”

Blair bites her lip to stop it from trembling, but there’s nothing to stop the way her heart cracks in two. 

“Sorry for interrupting last night.”

“That’s okay,” she says. “You have the rest of your life to make up for it.” He smiles, leaning his cheek into her palm. “Do you want Dan to make you breakfast, then we can head down to feed the ducks?”

“Yes, please.”

  
  


**_autumn._ **

“You awake?”

“Mm-hmm,” Blair hums, although she’s just barely. 

“Do you remember the first time we met?” She hums affirmatively again, and he continues, “Hen and I were talking about Fitzgerald, for his English class, and I pointed you out when you walked in and said something stupid like _it would be agony to comprehend that beauty in a glance,”_ he laughs, his fingertips tripping up and down her back, tracing each notch of her spine. “And Henry goes, _that’s my mom._ I think I almost fainted. Then you came over and rattled off your cappuccino order, and it was like I wasn’t even there. You looked right through me. _Beautiful, and without mercy.”_

He shifts to press a kiss to her lips, and even after a year it makes her stomach flip, and flip, and flip. 

“But then I mentioned that I was having an opening for the new exhibit, and you handed me your card, and said I should keep it on me. Do you remember? You said I looked like I needed your expertise. You were being demeaning, but the card smelled like your perfume, and I just looked at you, and I wasn’t even offended. I just thought, _yeah. I think I do._ And I kept the card on me. I still have it.”

(She remembers the opening, too; the nervous, fidgeting mess of him as he sidled up next to her. _This is what’s passing for art these days?_ she said, as he handed her a glass of white wine, their fingers brushing as she took it. 

_I know nothing in here compares to you but…_

She rolled her eyes, biting hard at the inside of her cheek to remain unperturbed. _I don’t flirt with clients._

He nodded, serious, glancing at his wrist as if there was a watch there. There wasn’t. _I’ll be back in two hours when your retainer’s up._

She hated how endearing it was, the delighted raise of his brows when her mouth turned up, a huff slipping out, like he couldn’t believe he’d made her laugh with that one.)

She tries to nuzzle closer, even though it’s nearly impossible, smushing her nose to his collarbone, their bare, damp limbs entangled. 

“I love you,” he says. _Mm-hmm,_ she murmurs again, her fingers raking through the mat of hair on his chest, tapping over his heart in response.

“Marry me,” he says. _Mm-hmm._

“Did you hear what I said?” _Mm-hmm._

“And... that was a...?”

She tips her head up slightly, eyes half-closed. “A yes.”

*

_“Mom!_ There’s –“

She enters with her index finger raised, and almost drops to her knees when she sees the display before her. Henry, in his vintage _The Replacements_ shirt Dan bought him for his birthday, holds his long arms out with pride, face smudged with sugar and flour. Dan looks a little disgruntled, but amused nonetheless.

She blinks between them, mouth trying to form around both their names at once. 

“Wunderkind almost gave himself third-degree burns,” Dan mumbles, making his way over to slip his arms around her waist, walking backwards and leading her into the colossal mess of the kitchen. 

Once seated, still having not spoken a word, Dan produces a small blue box. When he pops it open, she’s glad he had the foresight to make her sit down.

“I picked it out,” Henry says, bouncing on the balls of his feet. 

“Shut up,” Dan says. “This is my moment.”

Blair lets out a shuddered breath. The light hits the diamond, making a flight of colours dance around every surface of the kitchen. 

“I had this whole plan,” Dan says. “But last night –“ he stops, looking over at Henry. “I’ll spare details, but I just couldn’t wait any longer. I love you so much, Blair. And you too, kid, even though you’re a pain in my ass. So much of my life has felt aimless, and I didn’t even know it, I didn’t even realize that was what it was. But being here, for you and for Hen, and you two being here for me, it feels like there was a purpose all along, you know? It’s made everything make sense. So what d’you say?”

Blair sniffles once, twice, and then breaks out into a sob. “I already said yes last night!”

“I wasn’t sure you’d remember!”

She swings her arms around his neck, almost lifting him from his seat with the force of her hug. His arms encircle her, holding her closer, nuzzling his nose into her hair. She twists in his hold, sticking her hand out. 

“Come here, baby.”

Henry swipes fast at his eyes, wrinkling his nose. “I’m good.”

“Come _here._ Give me a hug.”

“Dan hasn’t showered yet.”

“Oh, fuck off, Waldorf.”

  
  


*

“My sister is deathly allergic to cats, so we’ll have to figure out something to do with her when she comes,” Dan says, a single finger curled over the top of her magazine to bend it down.

Blair hums considerately, taking a sip of her coffee. “Your sister?”

Dan gives her a _look._ Blair sighs. “I suppose Dorota can take Cat for a few days.”

He leans over the counter to kiss her forehead, her cheek, her lips. “This is a place of business,” she mumbles against his mouth.

“I don’t think the boss will mind.”

He kisses her once more before withdrawing, circling around the counter and into the gallery to a woman beckoning him with a wrinkled hand. Blair twirls her ring around her finger, around and around, the light catching the diamond and glinting off the silver of the espresso machine. She watches him over her shoulder, as he listens carefully to the woman inquiring about a painting.

She feels Henry’s eyes on the back of her head, strong enough to pull her face towards his. He considers her, then the ring.

“I think you should call Aunt S,” he says, simple and quiet. “She would want to know.”

Somewhere in the back of Blair’s mind she thinks: _yes, I should. Because now it’s me that has everything. Now it’s me that it’s all fallen into place for._

She washes it down and away with a sip of coffee. She says, “You’re right.”

*

The line is on its last ring when the receiver clicks. “As I live and breathe.”

“Hi, S.”

“Hey, princess.”

“Are you in the city?”

“I’m in a dressing room on 5th with my _mother_ is where I am.”

“Can I see you?”

“What’s wrong?”

“Nothing.”

“Is it Henry? Your mom?”

“Can’t I just want to see you?”

“Of course, babe. Sarabeth’s? Or drinks at Boulud?

“You’re drinking?” Blair says before she can stop herself. She pinches her fingers to the bridge of her nose. “Nevermind. Sarabeth’s is good.”

  
  


*

When she sees Serena through the window, with her hair windswept and her eternal summer glow, it’s like heatstroke in November. 

Serena always greets her like it’s only been days since they last saw each other, instead of months, instead of years. Blair likes to pretend she doesn’t keep track, didn’t tally mark the days in her head on her way here. 

Where Blair was never anything but grown up, Serena was stuck in the obscurity of childhood. Where Blair was lonely, Serena was lost. They exchange pleasantries like they didn’t exchange a promise to be friends forever. But that’s what this is, Blair thinks; following through. 

Blair raises her hand tentatively, wiggling her fingers a little. “I’m engaged.”

There are many tiny things that flit over Serena’s face in a short amount of time. When she speaks, it’s hopeful optimism — or naivety — that Blair hears: “Chuck?”

Blair clenches her teeth to keep from scoffing. _You sound like my mother,_ is what she wants to say, but somehow it feels too cruel for the soft light of the restaurant, for the person Blair has grown into.

“No,” she says simply, because it is. “His name is Dan.”

Serena smiles like there had been no stilted moment just previously. “Oh!” she says, and she clasps Blair’s hand in hers, tilting it from side to side, casting prisms on the counter. “It’s so beautiful. Tiffany, right?”

Blair nods, and Serena matches her, giddy. She says, “Tell me about him.”

“He’s –“ _Dan._ There’s no other way to put it, really. He’s Dan. Just like _she’s Serena,_ which means her hand in Blair’s will only be there for right now, and later Blair will miss it like a limb. Just like _he’s Chuck,_ which means he can do whatever he wants. He’s Dan, which means he feels like home. 

“He owns a gallery with a café. It’s where we met. Henry hangs out there after school, and they became friends. Henry really loves him. Sometimes, I almost get jealous, because Henry’s my best friend, but I think Dan might be he is.” She looks up, nervous suddenly, by her choice of words. Serena props her free hand in her chin, bats her lashes as if to say _more!_ “Dorota loves him, if you can believe it. He does a bad James Stewart voice when I get upset, to cheer me up. He makes us breakfast. He calls me sweetheart when I –“ she blushes, realizing where they are. It’s easy to get back into the rhythm of telling Serena everything, to trade stories like currency, indiscretions and accomplishments alike. It’s never easy when Serena packs them away, sets back off and carries them around the world. “When we – um, during, you know.”

Serena giggles, squeezing her hand. Blair stares at them, joined on the table in a tight embrace, her manicured nails and Serena’s bitten-down, chipped-polish ones. She clears her throat. “He’s not perfect, but he’s perfect for us.”

Serena thumbs the silver band, something distantly wistful in the way she looks at it. Blair asks, “Are you seeing anyone?”

Serena’s eyes glaze over, smile tightening just enough that Blair knows the answer before she hears it. “Carter and I...”

 _So that explains the drinking._ Serena trails off, waiting for a remark. Blair doesn’t give one, and so she continues: “I think it’s really going to work this time.”

“That’s great,” Blair says, but it’s not believable enough for Serena. It never is. 

“I miss my boy wonder. We should have lunch on the steps, like old times.”

Blair wonders if Serena really misses those times as much as she sounds like she does. Blair doesn’t, but there’s an empty space in her heart just big enough to fit the guilt that comes with realizing it. Maybe it’s enough that Serena still comes when she calls, even if she never stays. 

“Why don’t you come over for Thanksgiving? You can bring Carter. Like old times.”

  
  


**_winter, again._ **

The abundance of string lights twined around every surface of the diner wink discordantly, making the whole space feel like a sky full of rainbow stars. The last few patrons occupy little worlds of their own in each corner, like a Hopper painting in idle motion. The counter is covered over, Henry cramming for finals and Blair getting a jumpstart on wedding plans ( _a crazy event planner planning her own wedding sounds like a great Hallmark movie,_ remarks Dan). 

Henry looks up from his books suddenly, as if struck by the thought he shares: “Juilliard,” he says. “I’m going to choose Julliard.”

The acceptance letters have been coming in weekly, each one swelling Blair with so much pride she keeps unexpectedly bursting into tears, dotting each large envelope. He applied to Yale out of loyalty to her and got in. He applied everywhere else out of loyalty to himself, and got in, too.

Dan looks to her cautiously, ready to assess her reaction. Non-Ivy, but not without prestige. She presses her lips together, nods. “If that’s what you want, sugarplum.” 

Dan thinks the decision calls for a celebration, making them each a hot chocolate, complete with whipped cream and candy canes. It’s a little ridiculous. _As soon as possible,_ Blair jots down on her sheet under _date._

When she thinks Henry isn’t looking, she leans over the counter to lick the strip of rich chocolate and warmed whipped cream off Dan’s upper lip. Henry makes it known that he thinks they’re really, truly disgusting. 

There’s no one left but them when Henry finishes off his second cup, hopping off his stool and haphazardly shoving his books in his bag. “I’m going out. I won’t be home for dinner. Unless that was dinner.”

“Where?”

“Does it matter?”

“I’d like to know before the cops do.”

“I’m going to Eli’s.”

Blair catches Dan’s eye, both of them pausing. His eyebrows raise.

“And what do you and Eli have planned?”

“I don’t know, Mom, we don’t have an itinerary. We’ll probably just watch a movie or something.”

“Something new?” She turns to Dan, scrunching her nose. “What was that one we wanted to see?”

“Probably Netflix,” Henry says, visibly antsy. “Are we done with the interrogation?”

“You could stop by the house and look through the collection, if you’d like.”

“Blair,” Dan says, then tilts his head back, gesturing for her to lean in closer. He drops his voice, “I don’t think he’s going over there to watch a movie like how we watch a movie.” His bottom lip catches between his teeth for a beat. “I think it’s going to be more like our post-watching a movie.”

“I know that, Humphrey!” she says, a barely disguised whisper. She swivels in her chair to face Henry again. “Be safe.”

“You too,” Henry says. “I like being an only child.”

  
  


*

Later, with her head pillowed in Dan’s lap, not-really-watching _It’s a Wonderful Life,_ she rattles on about how _Eli’s a nice boy and all, but if this gets serious his mother is going to invite us to her tragic parties, and I mean, really, the woman can’t put together a menu to save her life and yet she refuses to hire me because she thinks she doesn’t need the help._

She pouts, her view of him obscured by his open book. “Pay attention to me.”

Without looking away from his book, his hand settles on her stomach, cool fingers creeping under the waistband of her underwear. Her hips twitch up as he dips lower, but still she swats him away.

“Not like that, perv. _Listen_ to me.”

“I _am_ listening.”

“Do you want one?”

“One what?”

She bites her lip, sitting up, her small hands fidgeting on his knee. “A baby.”

“Are you thinking of picking one up on your way home tomorrow?”

“You know what I mean. What Henry said. Do you feel the same way?”

Finally, he puts the book down, looking at her in that serious, inquisitive way of his. “Do you?”

She knows her answer without needing to think about it, but she feels the bit of guilt that’s been culminating ever since he slid the ring on her finger churn in her stomach. Blair loves the way Dan always tells her the truth. It makes her want to do the same.

“I just don’t want you to miss out on something you want.”

“I have everything I want,” he says, tilting her jaw towards his. “Besides, I already have my hands full with you two.” He kisses the tip of her nose, then bypasses her mouth and goes straight for her neck. “Although the only thing I’m missing out on is seeing you pregnant, because I’m sure you were beautiful.”

She gasps, shoving a hand over his face. “Dirty old man!”

“You know what I mean.”

*

“Oh shit,” Henry says. “Cat got you good.”

“Huh?” Dan says, turning to face him. Henry points at the back of his neck. The espresso machine spits out its last few dark drops, Dan almost knocking the cup over as his hand raises instinctively to touch the long, tender scratches. “Uh. Yeah. She sure did.”

“She usually loves you. What’d you do to piss her off?”

Dan sneaks a quick look up at Blair, then blushes back down. “It was definitely out of love.”

  
  
  
  



End file.
